A Writer's Tale

See how much they offer you, and you’ll immediately know whether they’ll be putting any effort into selling your book and whether they plan to print up more than a bare minimum number of copies.

Since publishers are always on the lookout for a “high concept” novel, you might hit a homerun by giving them one.

Provided you’re lucky or cunning enough to write it the way they think is appropriate.

And provided you have no mediocre track record that’ll warn them off.

My advice, however, is to avoid treasure hunting for a high concept.

Instead of trying to come up with the greatest gimmick in the history of the world, just go for a story that you’d like to read. In other words, write something that is close to your own experiences. And write it truly.

You can never go wrong that way.

And you won’t have to worry about someone else beating you to the punch. Because if you do it right, you’re writing a book that nobody can write but you.

You are the high concept.

On Outlines

WHEN I WAS IN SCHOOL, AN OUTLINE HAD A VERY SPECIFIC STRUCTURE. It looked something like this:

I. Topic Heading

A. a subdivision of the heading.

1. a subdivision of A.

2. and another.

a. with a couple of subdivisions

b. of its own.

1) and then you can go here

2) with further subdivisions

a) and then here

b) which gets a little crazy.

B. But if you have an A, you must have at least a B. It can have a host of subdivisions, too.

II. And you must have a II, or there was no point in having a I.

III. And on and on it goes.

This used to be what people meant by an “outline.” Among writers, agents and editors, however, an outline is something different.

It is a synopsis a brief version of your story. An “outline,” or synopsis, might be written for your own use as a blueprint for your novel or as a selling device.

I’ve got comments about both.

When embarking on a novel, should you start by creating an outline so you’ll have your route mapped out before you start the actual writing?

It’s debatable.

I recommend against it. In my own opinion, doing an outline is risky business.

1. There’s a good chance that you’ll “shoot your wad” on the outline. When you get around to writing the novel itself, you might find that you aren’t terribly excited about it. You feel as if you’ve already travelled this route and seen the sights before. So instead of writing the novel with a lot of creative energy, you may find yourself lukewarm about the thing. There’s not much excitement in following an outline, fleshing it out, padding it.

Your lack of enthusiasm will almost certainly show in the finished product. Your novel will probably have a “painted by the numbers” quality.

2. When writing an outline, you are building your novel on a superficial structure of logic. Tins leads to this leads to this leads to this, with all the causal elements carefully thought out.

Which should make for a novel in which everything ties together very nicely. This might be a great way to operate if you’re building a house. But you’re not an architect you’re Dr. Frankenstein trying to create life. Your novel doesn’t need a blueprint, it needs lightning.

3. Even if you are able to breathe life into your carefully outlined novel, its plot will almost certainly be predictable. By the act of outlining, you have not allowed the story to grow naturally out of itself. Instead, you’ve developed it by imposing a step by step logic on the events. You think, “Well, this needs to happen next. And it should lead to this.”

The problem is, most readers will already be familiar with the logical routine, so they’re not only with you, they’re one step ahead of you. Even a carefully calculated surprise, or “twist,” isn’t likely to come off very well if you’ve previously worked it all out, detail by detail, in your outline. If you want to surprise your readers, you need to surprise yourself.

A character has to surprise you, the writer, by doing something you never expected.

Or an incident needs to pop out of nowhere and screw things up.

If you outline, you’re pretty much shooting down your chances of spontaneity.

My advice is this. After you’ve come up with an idea for your novel, tinker around with it for an hour or two. Make some notes to yourself until you have a general idea about where you want to go with it.

Then start writing.

As Hemingway said, “Write one true sentence.” And then follow it with another.

Build your book one sentence at a time, meet the characters, get to know them, and let them lead the way. See where they want to take you. Play along. Let one event lead logically to another, but if something wild wants to happen, let it.

Learn by going.

An editor once told me that my plots seem very “haphazard,” as if I never know what is supposed to happen next. He meant it as a criticism. But I think it’s a quality that has contributed to whatever success I’ve had.

Readers often tell me, “I never know what’s going to happen next.”